The Smiley Smile Message Board

Okay - if the scenario played out like this, it would be more understandable....but still annoying: 'The Beach Boys return from England, hate what Brian has come up with for the SMiLE record....and persuade him to junk it and write a bunch of 'Surfin' USA' and "I Get Around' tunes'.
But what happened is - 'The Beach Boys returned from England, thought what Brian had come up with for the SMiLE record was too weird; so what happens? Brian junks the SMiLE album and they release an even WEIRDER album!! HUH???

And why butcher the brilliant 'In The Cantina' version of H&V in favor of the terrible, disjointed, and  mutilated released single version? Hell, the Beatles were releasing long songs like 'Strawberry Fields', 'Within You Without You' and 'A Day in the Life'. I don't think the world would have ended if The Beach Boys released the longer, more complete version of 'H&V'.

It's just so frustrating knowing that Surf's Up, Bicycle Rider, In The Cantina, Roll Plymouth Rock, and Child is Father of the Man were shelved while the bizarre 'She's Goin' Bald' with the sped up vocals and the vastly inferior re-working of Wind Chimes came out instead.

SMiLE was 'weird beautiful'; 'Smiley Smile' was just weird and unrewarding.......especially after all the press hype.


It's so sad to realize while reading Domenic Priore's 'Look Listen Vibrate Smile' that after "SMiLE'  failed to appear - that the Beach Boys were no longer considered in the same breath as the Beatles or Dylan. They blew it. Their moment passed. Oh, what could have been!

I think the "Produced by The Beach Boys" credit on Smiley Smile speaks volumes...

Same story that's been told tons of times, and same questions that we've been asking for years. Why oh why? Sure, the release of a completed SMiLE with full support and vocals of the boys and Van Dyke could have done wonders for The Beach Boys critically and perhaps commercially. The public may have viewed The Beach Boys much differently, obviously subsequent albums would have been much different and probably would have been completely different albums if Brian Wilson was more involved. Sure, I wish SMiLE was completed and released in '67, but I guess we'll never know how the group would have fared if that did happen. All we have now is the music that was finished, and we must appreciate it for how awesome it is and how crazy it makes me people like us who visit this board. God, I love The Beach Boys.

I agree it was a bizarre change of heart to shelve the "crazy, weird Smile"  and release the the even more befuddling Smiley.  However, I find Smiley to be very rewarding in its own way, and the version of Wind Chimes on Smiley is (IMO) the version.  It kicks the Smile versions butt all over the playground.   It's a great album in its own right.  Incredibly inventive, humorous, and yes, very strange - way stranger than I think Smile would have seemed.

Personally I hope that Smiley Smile's status is going to grow now that the original Smile sessions are finally being released. Smiley Smile deserves to be appreciated as a great experimental pop record in itself and for me it's an integral and legitimate part of the whole fascinating Smile saga. I love the group's lo-fi approach to psychedelic pop and I'm a huge fan of "Fall Breaks", "Wind Chimes", and even "Wonderful". All great stuff! "Little Pad" is just gorgeous, one of the group's best ever as far as I'm concerned.

little pad and she's going bald are great.  i think you can chalk up smiley smile to brian being burnt out on the big productions before his big production came out. 

the only part of Smiley's 'Wind Chimes' that kicks butt is the "whispering winds" section and the little descending a capella part that precedes it. so glad "whispering winds" was included on BWPS. You just can't beat the mellow vibes and overall grooviness of SMiLE's "Wind Chimes"

"Little Pad" is my favorite part of Smiley. One of the best pieces in the entire Beach Boys catalog, all of music, and life in general.

I believe the completion and release of SMILEY SMILE supports the notion that Brian was still in charge and considered the leader by the other Beach Boys. Whatever reservations the other band members had, they followed Brian's lead. I suspect they all thought that SMiLE was going to be completed and released until Brian said no. They may have recognized that SMILEY SMILE was a quickie that wasn't nearly as good as what they had been doing, but it's what Brian was asking them to do.

Great replies, everyone. Thanks!

I hated Smiley Smile at first. Couldn't live without it now. It took years but I'm SO pleased it happened.

The SMiLE songs that trickled through were and are amazing. The b**ts are allegedly amazing ;) Very soon we'll have The Bigger Picture  8)

Isn't it great to have Smiley Smile also? Different direction but loads MORE incredible music which no other band on the planet could have ever done. Don't care any more about what happened or could have happened way back then...... SMiLE could have been rushed out at the time and maybe would have had little of its deserved impact at the time, and certainly compared with that which we are about to experience!!! It is On Its Way!

We are all very lucky in all respects! Now please next let us have Smiley Smile and Wild Honey in stereo.

Hell, the God Lindsey Buckingham has just released a new album and I couldn't care less! I want that SMiLE box!!!

Sometimes a bunt will produce home runs-The box set could well enhance SS's stock .

Would there be enough material for a Smiley box?  Not that they'd do one, but if they did?   
I like the Smile Wind Chimes too, but the Smiley version is my favorite, maybe cos that's the one I heard first.  It's spooky and beautiful.  I prefer the Smiley Vegetables as well. 
It took time to grow on me though, because I too, when i first heard it was like"What the hell?"  And yet there was something about it that made me continue to listen to it, and I really grew to love it.  I consider it one their all time best actually and one of the most unique albums released by anyone ever anywhere. 

Agree entirely, Paul, particularly with your assessment of the sublime Smiley Wind Chimes. The intimacy, delicacy and proximity of the vocals, the gorgeous backing track and the loose, relaxed, gently falling background vox, and the sublime, deep in the well chorale - a gem. SMiLE version has always felt fanciful and lightweight in comparison, not lonely, forlorn, spooked, stoned, frightened, and holy like the Smiley track. I love the exchange of timbres in the round of lead vocals - like we are laying on the floor in the dark with them, passing around that hash pipe...

I honestly think the one thing that keeps Smiley Smile from being a stone cold classic to everyone is one thing: the fact that it is missing the important classic payoff song, ala "A Day in the Life".

And we know what song that is....."SURF'S UP"

It seemed like quite a few of the reviews at the time of the review mention the lack of this song. And I honestly, I think Smiley Smile almost works as an album. With "Surf's Up", it would have had its third cornerstone (the others being "Heroes and Villains and "Good Vibrations"), and its emotional masterpiece. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, it seems it was not considered for release. I think the rest of the material on the album is top class, but I just think there's no payoff, and that's why album seems like it's missing something. Pet Sounds had its payoff in songs like "God Only Knows" and "Caroline No", and Smiley Smile didn't.

I think the appearance of "Heroes" and "Surf's Up" at the same time, on the same album, would have had a major effect for the boys, and may have changed things. I just gotta wonder why it wasn't considered for the album, because it seems most of the SMiLE biggies were. And of course, after the Smiley sessions, Brian returned to it, possibly either for Wild Honey or possibly the 10-track SMiLE, or maybe neither.

But yeah thats where I stand.

And yet, I still enjoy Smiley Smile more than Sgt.Peppers. Go figure. imo.

Smiley Smile is SMiLE!

I don't think I'd trade Smiley for a completed SMiLE.

The bottom line is The Beach Boys just didn't support Brian's "SMiLE" vision period.  The album was also overdue by several months and there was demand for new product.  This was 1967 where bands were still expected to release product at a breakneck pace.  So The Beach Boys got together and recorded a hastily made LP that some fans love and others hate and put it out there.  The fact that it was weird or weirder than SMiLE in my opinion has no bearing, they needed to release product and this was product period.

Ok, this statement, I've never understood this. Check this out from Andrew's site.
From the timeline: "May (1967)  publicist Derek Taylor announces the abandonment of Smile in the rock press, the first mention being on the 2nd ."
But from the Shows & sessions you'll notice that the Beach Boys played their first show on the 1967 European Tour on May 2nd 1967 and had been playing an East Coast (US) Tour for the two weeks before they left for Europe.
So instead of the Boys coming back and saying we don't like this get rid of it, it looks more like Brian actually waited until they left the country to cancel it and the band couldn't do anything about it for two weeks, until they got back after their last show on the 19th.

I also remember reading that Derek Taylor had made an announcement after "Inside Pop" aired, April 26th, that the album was done and would soon be released, something like "all 12 track are complete" but I'll have to look that one up.
Weird timing when you look at the tour schedule.

The biggest three that suffered most transitioning from Smile to Smiley Smile, in my opinion, and they've already been mentioned by others:

A. Wind Chimes. Besides the multiple piano overdubs at the end, a section which Michael Vosse remembers they used to beg Brian to play the dub for them because it was so good, there is a stunner of a split second on the track. Use the box set from '93 as the sample until the new one is out. Just as the quiet section has built up to the point of bursting, and it's still relatively quiet, there is a beautiful, perfect split second of pure silence that creates nothing but anticipation...then a fully-orchestrated section with blasting vocals, heavy reverbed drums, and the whole band in the studio explodes musically. Just a pure blast of sound and sonics, which carries on for a bit, then lapses back into a gentle piano, which also builds.

Groundbreaking, influential arranging and production. Taking the "Surprise Symphony" concept and executing it electronically on a pop record - about as perfect a bit of silence as possible. Whether the pace and timing of that edit was from Brian, Chuck Britz, or Mark Linett, I don't care - it's amazing.

B. Wonderful. That '93 box set version is what took the music of Smile to a whole new level for me, just a beautiful piece of music and an arrangement which perfectly compliments the melody and chords. A perfect recording in almost every sense, terrific backing vocals and counterpoints...about the only thing missing seemed to be a way to end the song, because musically it could go on forever, verse after verse, and not feel like it needed to end. The subsequent versions, for whatever reason, Brian added parts and changed things that removed most of the neo-classical brilliance of that piano version on the box set. For me at least.

C. Heroes & Villains. The "In The Cantina" section itself is about a good and moving a section of music as Brian ever wrote, in my opinion again. Those piano chords and the feel he played them with...perfect. Apart from that, the Cantina mix hums with a low-frequency energy similar to the chorus of Good Vibrations...and add the tape explosion, various vocals that were cut out or changed...it's just a damn good record. And in comparison, that "x factor" of energy in that mix seems to have left by the time the Smiley Smile version was mixed down.

Just my 2 cents. :)

Very well said guitarfool, especially with respect to "Heroes."  That one is almost more of a tragedy than the other two, because at least they were re-arranged to the point of being unrecognizable, making them so different that you really can't compare them to the Smile versions. 

"Heroes" was the worst victim of Brian's tinkering.  He had it perfect in February (and potentially at other points too), but the single version has always been such a let-down for me.  All the excitement is gone, and it was no longer the "3 minute musical comedy" that Brian had originally envisioned. 

alternte heores wa sso much better thna the released verison i cannot stand the chorus its terrible i still cnaot  hreoes and villains just see what youve done the alternae is much better than the releaed really.

I was making that point in the Mike Love is a jerk thread.  The beach boys and their opinion of the album had nothing to do with Brian scrapping the album.  Brian's insecurity/depression/mental issues scrapped that album.  The Beach Boys released whatever the hell Brian wanted them to release, he had them in his back pocket.....











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and STILL! Has them in his back pocket.  Brian Wilson could snap his fingers and Mike & Al would come running to record whatever the hell he wanted them to.  Tommorow.  they're BEGGING him to work with them.  This is how it's always been.  Dennis and Carl of course loved Brian to death too and always recorded whatever he wanted them to. 

All you needed to add was IMO and I'd have been fine with this post. Not everyone agrees you know

I personally think the Smiley Smile Wind Chimes is the greatest thing they ever recorded, but then I hear beyond the surface to the structure within. You obviously only hear things on a very simple level, i.e, just the production.

Smiley Smile contains as many brilliant musical moments as SMiLE, it's just the bare bones.

As for Hereos and Villains, the Smiley Smile version flows much better than the Cantina version. All about structure and balance again.

Answer is pretty simple he ran out of energy and inspiration, why? Drugs, pressure, band members being resistant, bad relationship. So what do you release when you promised an album and are all out of energy?

I think the single version of H&V is hands down the best version there is. The Smiley parts contrast perfectly with the older parts, giving the song a really eerie quality.

No version of "Surf's Up" would ever fit though.  Smiley is a goofball record  by someone who has given up and isn't really enjoying humor, but making it anyway and trying to force/rectify a family dynamic.  It's not a grandiose statement like Smile.

If Smiley Smile didn't have Smile tunes, we wouldn't confuse the records at all.  They're not the same record, period.  You get some of the same compositions because he had to put something out and that's what he had to work with.  And I think that's why the band was okay with that record coming out, even if some feel it's weirder.  They had to release something, and this was at least a record they could play easily.

Both records are absolutely part of the same initial inspiration, but they are totally different products.  It's like a person at very different times in their life--they've changed.

I mostly agree with you.  I love almost every track on Smiley, but as I've said, that version of "Heroes" just doesn't work for me.  It's a little too structured, IMO.  Too much of the song is consumed with the verse and chorus (which is too long, if you ask me).  I love the other sections, particularly "my children were raised" through "sunny down snuff," but the rest just isn't adventurous enough.  What I love about the Cantina version is that it's fast moving, exciting - you don't know where the hell it's going to go, and you're just knocked out by the rapid succession of one amazing section after another.  It doesn't over-rely on one or two ideas to carry it like the single version does.

Personally, I like the 'Cantina' version, and that's what I use in my Smile playlists.  However, it really doesn't sound complete.  It really does sound like "part 1" of some mysterious longer version of H&V. 

I know that Chuck Britz talked about a 5-6 minute version of H&V that was as good or better than GV. Frankly, though, I've never heard any version or mix of 1966-67 H&V that truly sounds like it could have been an artistic and commercial triumph on the level of Good Vibrations. 

" It was done like 'Good Vibrations'; it was just one hell of a song. It was a great song.Then, I understand, they went up to his home, and they did a lot of things. They cut it and inserted an organ down at the bottom of (Brian's) pool to get the pool quality.They did all kinds of things, but I think basically it could have been as good a classic as 'Good Vibrations' or better. Our (version) ran about five or six minutes; it was just a further step from 'Good Vibrations'. It had some great melodic lines. The arrangement was so full, and it was just something that I was very disappointed in when I heard the final product."

I don't know.  Perhaps the 45 in the box set will be a reconstruction of this version.  Or not.  We'll see.

Some folks will probably strongly disagree with me on this, but I actually think a more rockin' H&V along the lines of Al's live version from early '70s (e.g., on the In Concert album) might have had more potential to be a #1 hit.

A lot of good points here.  I'm probably not anymore of a H&V guy than I am a GV guy as I love both records however I think given the wealth of material Brian tracked for H&V It had the potential to be one of the most commercially successful pop records of all time, better than GV because conceptually I believe it was more advanced than GV. 

I've always felt the same way about the "Cantina Mix"  myself as well, I don't feel it's definitive but it's the closest thing out there to a mix of the song that actually sounds alive for lack of a better term.  The Smiley mix to my ears sounds underwater, its like someone placed blankets over the speakers and tried to blast a real groovy tune through them.  No offense to those that enjoy it but I've always found it pretty horrid or should I say the mix is horrid because the parts that comprise that mix aren't bad.

I remember someone (Mok?) put together a mix of H&V that I really enjoyed where he sourced everything from the multi-track tapes and the clarity of the song improved greatly.  I think this is so important to get across as it is a lack of sonic clarity that I feel is H&V's greatest detriment. 

Agreed the Smiley Heroes has the flow, but the "cantina" version is more exciting.  And in total agreement that it sounds incomplete, like there should be more to it, and maybe it would have been the "Part 1."  It sounds liek that, like you'd listen to that then flip the single over and you have the continuation on the b-side. 

I have another question, which maybe ought to be placed in the boxset thread, but people keep referencing a Wild Honey era Surf's Up as being on the coming release - where is that listed?  I know there's a Surf's Up 1967 listed, is that it?  How do we know that is from the WH sessions?  I don't know all the session date info, so I am assuming Surf's Up was only logged as being recorded in '66, and that this is where that assumption comes from?   Could it not be from the Smiley Smile sessions?  This may have been answered in some other thread but these Smile threads are getting so long that I haven't the fortitude to try and find it.  Just curious, though I guess my question(s) will be answered in about 2 months.

Surf's Up 1967 has been confirmed to be the WH version by people on this forum who would know what is what.  

Oh, well, then since I rarely know what's what I'll accept that answer and look forward to Nov. 1st.   I wonder what that is going to sound like"?

 Quote from Guitarfool re "Wind Chimes": "there is a stunner of a split second on the track."

That's actually a dodgy tape splice, which goes silent for that brief moment so as not to wreck the rhythm coming out of the prior section.   If it had been butt-spliced cold it would sound like a mistake.

It will be interesting to see if this is "rectified" on TSS, or they could find a better mix/edit of this section, that makes a more musical version of this edit.  (It should sound like the transition into the big band section on the BWPS Wind Chimes).

personally I think that both H&V and GV seem out of place on smiley smile..they are just too complex compared to the rest of the songs..

It is perplexing, great posts on the songs of SS.  Not sure who else in the band were doing some drugs at the time besides Brian.
(Doesn't Al claim to have never done drugs. Mike?  But was Mike smoking mj at the time)

But in hindsight,I'm glad we have Smiley Smile; they could well have done nothing for a year.  Or split up.

Are you kidding me? Al was baked as a cake from Wild Honey to Holland.

Back in the day everyone on the in knew that when you saw Al Jadine anywhere at any time of day the man was high out of his mind on the finest buds in California. Sure he was a square for a little while but who wasn't? Were you born shooting dope? Al Jardine wrote Wake The World to celebrate his wake n bake erryday routine.

Wouldn't surprise me.  But I just read the interview from Mike talking about the band "anti-drug faction" (Mike, Al and Bruce) vs. the drug faction (the Wilsons).  I're read interviews where Al claims he never did drugs ("keeping it clean with Al Jardine").  Course, I never really believe everything I read.  As to artist drug use, the PR side tries to project and alternate reality frequently.

Were you born shooting dope? - Huh?

Wondering how much effect drugs had on the weirdness of Smiley Smile.

Dope... was a joke. Were you born shooting dope [i.e., that cool]. The joke is... shooting dope is not really cool at all.

Little known fact about Al Jardine: it's all lies. Why do you think he wanted to be a dentist so bad? FOR THE ENDLESS FREE SUPPLY OF NITROUS OXIDE! Al was the one who turned The Wilson's onto Reddi Whip which we know they were so fond of. Al Jardine first had laughing gas as a kid and was hooked for life. When Al gets stressed out he just goes to the dentist for a nice long session with nitrous oxide. The pitch shifted vocals on She's Goin Bald are totally a Reddi Whip creation/idea.

 ;) That's why I said this: "Whether the pace and timing of that edit was from Brian, Chuck Britz, or Mark Linett, I don't care - it's amazing."

One listener's dodgy can be another listener's amazing. I loved that box set version with that splice: any version on other sources without it still doesn't sound as cool to my ears.

The mood of the times was changing so rapidly then, for those who remember it.

November 66 felt very different to September 67, and Smiley Smile suited the latter perfectly. I also think it had wider appeal in the sense of humour and less personal 'troubled sensitive soul' aspect which had pervaded Today/Pet Sounds etc.

Smile would have been different again, in say May 67 just before Flower power and Pepper, but Brian was trying to do the work of the 4 Beatles and George Martin combined -  never gonna happen.

I WAS TOO BUSY PARTYING TO REMEMBER THE 60S DUDE, AN ENTIRE DECADE WENT BY WITHOUT ANY RECOLLECTION ON MY PART. OH, MY ALZHEIMER'S...

When Smiley was released,I thought it was a dreadful,depressing album--Since then I have come full circle,I now find Smiley to be mezmerizing even historic because of it's weirdness and rythmic arrangments of BW's SMiLE stuff.

Hmm, I could actually see the strange style of that album giving someone these feelings. To compare Pet Sounds > Smiley Smile (!!!!!!) - PS's substantial emotional depth in a normative sense and SS's abstract acid tinged stoned psychedelic humor, it's like there's been a total break in Brian Wilson's reality. A huge transformation has occured. The last we heard of him he was sensitive soul singing about lost innocence in Caroline No. Now he's still tripping on the same thought in Wonderful but it's become almost demonic, sick, perverted. Strange transition. Good Vibrations was the bridge inbetween the two worlds, the prayer that took them there, into the abstract beyond, out of the normal into the unusual.

Going back to the post that started this thread, IMHO the reason that SMiLE didn't come out was because of Brian Wilson. Why do you think it's coming out in November? Brian said it was okay.

I think it was in '68 when Brian said something about SMiLE being personal but not right for the public. He was good with it but maybe it wasn't right, or 'inappropriate', for the masses.

This is all awesome SMiLE stuff. The challenge is to make everything work out okay so that you can explain nearly everything. Awesome. I have my answer.